1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ink jet printing system including a method of ink jet printing on a cloth with satisfactory saturation, a set of inks for use in the method, and an ink jet printing apparatus for use in the method, and to a printed article produced by the printing system.
2. Related Art
At present, textile printing is mainly performed by screen printing and roller printing. However, the foregoing methods are not suitable for manufacturing various products in a small quantity and difficult to follow the fashion quickly. Therefore, an electronic textile-printing system using no plate has been desired.
In order to meet the foregoing desire, a multiplicity of ink jet textile-printing systems have been disclosed from various industrial fields.
The ink jet textile-printing system must meet the following requirements:
(1) Realized colors must have sufficiently thick density. PA0 (2) A high degree of exhaustion of pigment must be realized on a cloth and waste water must easily be treated after the washing process. PA0 (3) Irregular bleeding due to color mixture must be restricted on the cloth. PA0 (4) A large color-reproduction range must be realized. PA0 (5) Production must always stably be performed. PA0 (6) Clear color must be realized. PA0 (7) Saturation must not deteriorate even in a case where colors in the same type are mixed as well as in a case where different colors are mixed with one another.
In order to meet the foregoing desires, there have been employed the following means: any of various additives is added to an ink; the quantity of ink ejection is adjusted; and the cloth is subjected to pre-treatment.
A textile-printing method using a disperse dye, for example, an ink jet textile-printing method for printing on a polyester cloth, has been disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 61-118477. The method uses a disperse dye, the sublimation temperature of which is 180.degree. C. or higher. However, if textile-printing is performed by using an ink comprising a disperse dye having a high-saturation hue while paying attention to only the sublimation temperature, excellent color can be imparted with excellent saturation in a case where each ink is used individually in dyeing. However, some combinations of dyes, in the foregoing case, deteriorate the saturation and considerably vary the density, tone and the reproducibility after dyeing if dyeing is performed under the same conditions, thus resulting in that the foregoing requirements (1), (4), (5), (6) and (7) cannot simultaneously be satisfied. The foregoing method is unsatisfactory to perform various color reproductions.
In particular, the field of sportswear exemplified by swishing suits and ski wear involves a necessity of imparting clear colors. Therefore, it is an important factor to obtain a printed article while maintaining the saturation and realizing a wide color-reproduction range.